Toxic E-Cigarettes

The Lethal Dangers Of E-Cigarettes

We all know about the dangers of nicotine. We're not old-timey cowboys.

And in the increasingly health-conscious society that we currently live in, fewer and fewer people are smoking every year, which is incredible. With that being said, not a day goes by lately that I don't see someone puffing on an e-cig. Hell, even top-notch, award winning A-listers like Stephen Dorff are shooting commercials for them. We've all seen it. A black and white shot of the Dorff, walking on the beach in slow motion, enjoying one of those little smokeless wonders.

Newsflash, world: Don't listen to Stephen f*cking Dorff.

And that rule is actually universally applicable, but in this case, I'm using it specifically in reference to e-cigarettes. Honestly, until this morning I was blissfully unaware that these, too, are extremely harmful to your health. Over the weekend, the New York Times published an eye-opening article on the topic. First off, these things aren't approved by the FDA! Seriously. One might assume they are, but they're absolutely not. And why, you may ask, will they never get anything even close to an approval? Because they're full of poison!

Yes, nicotine, in its liquid form, is wildly potent. And it just so happens that the key ingredient in e-cigs is the often-flavored e-liquids. Toxicologists actually warn that if e-liquids are either ingested or absorbed through the skin, they can cause vomiting, seizures, or in some extreme cases, even death. And this goes double for children, who I could easily see being drawn to the fruity flavors.

Lee Cantrell of the California Poison Control System was quoted as saying, "It’s not a matter of if a child will be seriously poisoned or killed, it’s a matter of when."

What!? That's terrifying! It also means that any parent who currently leaves e-liquids laying around the house is playing with fire. And let's be honest, there's no doubt in my mind that hundreds of thousands of households fall into the aforementioned category. And yes, I'm well aware that there are countless household items which could be potentially harmful when swallowed by a child. But how many of those items do kids see their parents pouring into something that they then smoke?

And unbeknownst to most, the negative effects are already happening. The Poison Control Center estimates that their number of nicotine-ingestion-based cases rose to 1,351 last year, a whopping 300% increase from 2012. And on top of that, there's also been one reported death, a suicide by someone who purposely injected the lethal toxin.

So while this number is almost laughable in comparison to the number of actual cigarette-related deaths in our country, make no mistake about it, liquid nicotine is a very genuine problem. Keep it away from your children. But also, let's be honest, guys, you should just keep it away from yourselves too. I'd never downplay how hard it is to quit smoking, but if you go with e-cigarettes, you're just replacing poison with poison.